


Outtakes

by servantofclio



Series: Family Affairs series [3]
Category: Mass Effect
Genre: F/M, Family, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-08-03
Updated: 2012-10-18
Packaged: 2017-11-11 07:40:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,577
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/476182
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/servantofclio/pseuds/servantofclio
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Some scenes that didn't fit into the main storyline.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This one is set the night Garrus and Shepard arrived at the family estate (coincides with Ch. 3 of A Family Occasion)

Garrus sat on the grounds outside the estate house and looked up at the stars. He’d always liked being outdoors there; inside, not so much. They’d used to come up regularly when he was a kid, escaping the summer heat of the lowlands for the cooler climate of the mountains. Even then, things had been fraught. He hadn’t always been aware, when he was very young, but as he’d grown older, he’d gotten more sensitive to the air of tension that surrounded the place. The way his mother smiled less often, even though they were on vacation. The way Great-Aunt Livia had been stiffly, punctiliously polite.

She’d been in residence even then, and old even then. It seemed as though she’d been old his entire life. Retired, even then, after a career in Survey. Planetary exploration. Ended when she’d fallen down a cliff on a high-gravity world, breaking several bones in her legs and pelvis, which had never set quite right. It wasn’t a career for a woman with a bad leg, and she’d been seventy-odd at the time, so she’d taken a graceful retirement.

She didn’t like to be asked about her health, so he’d refrained. That hadn’t stopped her from asking a series of hinting questions aimed at finding out what had happened to _him_. 

He sighed and leaned back on his elbows. Shepard had headed to her guest room a while back looking worn out. He’d wanted to follow just to make sure she was all right, but he hadn’t been able to extricate himself from conversation with Livia. Solana had gone with her, which made him feel a little better. Of course she was all right, but she was still recovering, and it had been a long day, and his family could be hard to take even if you knew them, which she didn’t. Maybe he should have tried to prepare her better. He imagined himself handing her dossiers on his kin and snorted at the image.

Quiet footsteps behind him, slightly uneven. Solana. She sat down beside him and handed him a beer.

“Thanks.” He took a drink.

“No problem.” She opened her own bottle.

“Thanks for helping Shepard find her room.”

“No problem, again. I like her.”

“Good.”

They drank in silence for a moment, before Sol said, “Tycus was telling her something about how you just wanted the family to validate your life choices.”

Garrus groaned.

“I smacked him for you, so don’t bother.”

“It not as if he’s entirely wrong,” Garrus muttered.

“You know, if you actually talked to Dad, you might feel better.”

“I have talked to Dad.”

“About logistics and being Primarch, yeah. About the two of you, not so much.”

“Sol, leave it alone. We’ll work things out in our own time.”

“Sure you will.” She sighed. “Fine, I’m leaving it.” Then she punched him in the shoulder. “Omega, Garrus, really?”

He rubbed his shoulder. “Ouch.”

“Really? You went off to Omega and did your best to get yourself killed, and you didn’t even tell me?”

“Well, I knew you’d react like that, so—”

“And I’d have been _right_. Garrus. You used to tell me things.”

“You had enough with thinking about Mom—”

She hit him again, open-handed this time. “And you didn’t think I’d wonder where my only brother was after not hearing from him for months? A year? How did you think that little adventure was going to end?”

He shifted his weight, uncomfortably, and had no answer for her.

She went on, more quietly, “What, did you think we’d eventually shrug and say ‘well, I guess Garrus isn’t coming back. Good riddance’? Did you really think I wanted to lose my brother as well as my mother? What the _fuck_ were you thinking?”

He sighed deeply and tipped his head back. The stars shone down silent and distant. “I wasn’t. Thinking, I mean. I wasn’t thinking that far ahead, or that clearly. I wanted... to make a difference. To do something purposeful.”

After a moment, she said, “I missed you, you idiot.”

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry I went away and didn’t tell you, and let you worry.”

She nodded and wrapped an arm around him. “Apology accepted. Baby brother, don’t you ever pull something like that again.”

Part of him wanted to tease, to ask “or what?” But he’d learned, over the years, how to pick his moments. “I won’t.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Takes place during ch. 8 of A Family Occasion, after the argument between Livia and Callex Vakarian that Shepard overheard.

Garrus found his father on a balcony outside one of the second-floor sitting rooms. He might have been a statue, sitting stock-still in an old wooden chair. Garrus had made no particular effort to approach silently, but he hesitated in the doorway, unsure what to say. _Shepard overheard you_ —no. _Were you arguing with Livia?_ No. 

Once, he knew, it wouldn’t even have occurred to him that his father might be in need of some company. Or comfort. Guess he really had learned a few things over time. “Dad,” he said, by way of greeting.

His father gestured to the chair beside him, and Garrus took it. Sitting in silence, Garrus looked out. It wasn’t the most spectacular view at the estate; he was partial to the westward views, because of how the ridge opened up to the plain below. Eastward, the way they faced now, it was mostly hill and forest. Lightly populated, and so largely untouched by the Reapers, even though the dense vegetation and rugged terrain had provided good hiding space for the turian resistance.

“Your mother always liked this view the best,” his father said suddenly.

“Do you know why?”

“She was raised in the city. She always said the western view was too open. The forest felt more populated, she said.”

Garrus hmmed in response. After a moment, his father continued. “She never really liked it up here, but I... we thought it was important that you and Solana should experience the outdoors.”

We. Whatever personal differences they’d had, his parents had settled them behind closed doors and kept a united front before their children. Even with his father on the Citadel for weeks or months at a time, his mother always expressed the rules of the household as “we.” He’d been... nearly thirteen, or fourteen, even, before he learned to read the subtle signs of disagreement between them. “I always liked it up here,” he offered. “I liked running in the woods, and how we used to go shooting.”

His father nodded. “Good,” he said softly, and Garrus thought he understood the subtext for once: _then it was worth it_. “How is Shepard finding Palaven?”

“She says it’s beautiful. I took her out hiking in the woods a couple of times.” No need to mention the... other activities they’d engaged in. “She grew up on Earth, but she hasn’t spent this long planetside in a while.”

His father nodded again. The silence settled between them again. Garrus fidgeted in his seat and then began to speak just as his father did. 

The older man chuckled, briefly. “Go ahead.”

Garrus said, “I don’t... I don’t think I ever thanked you properly for looking after Shepard while she was hurt. While I couldn’t. It means a lot to me.” It was real acceptance, that he hadn’t been sure of having, even after his father had accepted his request to bring Shepard into the family. It reminded him, too, of his own failings. He took a deep breath. “I’m sorry I wasn’t here more while Mom was ill.”

His father hummed thoughtfully. After a moment, he said, “I was going to say that your mother would have liked Shepard. I am glad to have had the opportunity to become acquainted with her.”

Garrus suppressed a smile at his father’s characteristically measured, formal manner. “Do you really think so? I wish they could have met, but...” He broke off, swallowing down the strain in his subvocals.

“Yes,” his father said firmly. “She was always good at seeing beneath the surface of things. And she had great trust in you.”

Garrus blinked at the oblique praise. “I wish she could have been here,” he said quietly.

His father looked back out over the forest vista. “So do I.”


	3. For Krannt

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Grunt is posted to Palaven during the Reaper War and makes some acquaintances.

In camp, both krogan and turians kept the lights low at night to avoid attracting Reaper attention. They took advantage of the fact that the atmosphere was thick with smoke and particles, dust from the turian cities that the Reapers had bombarded. Might as well, even if the turians in the camp didn’t like it. They’d picked up some more that day, made contact with the remnants of a resistance group who were running out heat sinks and medi-gel. Only six of them. The turian captain in their joint force had had to talk pretty fast to convince them to come along. But they were here now, part of the divided camp. Krogan on one side, turians on the other, eating their separate rations, casting wary looks across the dividing line.

One of the krogan warriors made a crack about the stench of burning in the air. Grunt moved in to deal with it, but a turian got there first. 

“What the hell is the matter with you? That’s the smell of our _dead_ , you—”

The krogan drew breath for a retort, but Grunt punched him in the face first. “Watch your tongue,” he growled at the warrior, before turning to the turian. He noted the bandaged leg and the crestless head. Female. He ignored the tank imprint that whispered five ways to disable a turian female in the back of his mind. “Sorry,” he said. He half-turned back to the other krogan to say, “Insults to our allies are foolish.” The warrior growled back at him, but backed off, in no mood to challenge him. Grunt was satisfied.

“Allies,” said the turian, and laughed. “Right. I keep forgetting.”

“You must have been out of contact for a while,” said Grunt mildly. He noticed the way she was swaying on her feet and offered a hand. She ignored it.

“You could say that,” she said. “No contact with command since the invasion, and then you show up...” She shook her head.

A second turian came up with a small light in one hand. “What’s going on, Solana?”

“I’m fine, Dad,” she said, irritable. “Just talking to our _ally_ here.” 

“Of course you’re fine,” he returned dryly. “How could I possibly have been confused?”

She snorted. As she started to turn away, the light caught her face, and Grunt saw it clearly for the first time.

“Wait,” he said, and both turians paused. “What’s your name?”

She gave him a narrow-eyed look, wary. Grunt slammed a first into his own chest. “I am Urdnot Grunt.”

She nodded, recognizing the offering. “Solana Vakarian.”

Grunt nodded in satisfaction. He had recognized the marks, then. “Like Garrus. Good, I was right.”

She had been turning away again, but now she turned back so fast that the older turian put a hand under her elbow. “Wait just a minute,” she said. “How the hell do you know my brother?”

“We are krannt,” Grunt informed them. “We killed a thresher maw together, on the sands of Tuchanka, on the day of my Rite.” He stretched out his arms and lifted his head, remembering the shriek of the worm and the stink of fire and acid. “Together we faced the Collectors and killed the Reapers’ rachni minions.” He let his arms fall and added, “I am honored to meet the clanmates of one of my krannt.”

The two of them were both staring at him. Solana looked at her father. “Thresher maw? Did you know about that?” He shook his head, slowly. She let out a breath. “Garrus has a lot of explaining to do.”

#

The company ran into Reaper units the next day. Grunt was pleased. He enjoyed pumping incendiary rounds into the fleshy sacs of the ones called Ravagers. He also enjoyed ripping their limbs off with his bare hands and crushing their scuttling young underfoot. 

The Vakarians had proven to be worthy warriors, as he had known they must. The female, Solana, was not mobile due to her injury, but her grenades sent husk limbs flying everywhere, in a delightful shower of flesh and fluid. The older male was an excellent shot.

“I am pleased to see you worthy of your clanmate,” Grunt told them after the battle.

Solana looked at him with that faint widening of the eyes. Then she laughed. “Yeah. Thanks.”

He almost worried about them, though. Solana did not complain, but it was clear she could not keep up on foot, and her movements were hampered with pain. They had medi-gel, but no real medics. Krogan did not need them, and the turian one had died several days back (a lucky shot from the Reaper-altered version of one of their own kind). The elder Vakarian kept up in grim silence, but he was older and grew tired faster than most of the turians. Grunt kept an eye on them and turned the problem over in his mind. He knew what his battlemaster would do, he decided.

So when they made contact with a second group of turians, who had active comms, and their leaders made the decision to call for an extraction shuttle, Grunt went to the two of them. “You should go,” he told them.

It was not hard to recognize Solana’s expression as a scowl, turian or no. “The hell I will. I’m not leaving my planet.”

“You’re injured,” he told her. “Go, heal, and return to fight again.”

She started to speak again, but her father stopped her. “You need real medical attention,” he said.

She scowled again and limped away. “You should go with her,” Grunt told him.

He nodded. “I will. I know I am slowing the rest of you down.”

Grunt clapped him on the shoulder. “We need our elders for their brains, not their speed,” he said.

The old man’s mandibles twitched. “I... yes, thank you.”

#

The Reapers came when the evacuation shuttle did, harvesters dropping loads of their foot soldiers to overwhelm their position. The Vakarians were the last to board. Grunt saw that they did, lifting Solana bodily to set her inside the hatch, lending the father a hand so he could board as the shuttle hovered. He turned to Grunt before the hatch closed. “Thank you,” he said. “You have proven a true ally.”

Grunt nodded. “I would be nothing less to the clan of the mate of my battlemaster.”

“What?” Solana demanded, eyes narrowing.

“Your battlemaster?” her father asked.

“My battlemaster is Shepard. She has no equal,” he told them, and turned back to the fray, pleased to hear the shuttle’s hatch slamming closed behind him, cutting off Solana’s raised voice.

#

Garrus groaned. “I should have wondered why Dad didn’t look surprised when I told him.”

“A mate like Shepard is nothing to be ashamed of,” Grunt rumbled, in warning tones.

“I _know_ that, Grunt. I just married her, didn’t I?”

Grunt subsided. He could tell that the ritual he had witnessed that day was important to the turians and the humans, though krogan had nothing similar. He would respect their tradition.

“Hey,” said Garrus. “I owe you one. Thanks for making sure they got off-planet.”

Grunt looked around and spied Solana on her feet, dancing with some of the humans. He bared his teeth at Garrus. “Don’t mention it. We are krannt.”


End file.
